The essential TUM-IAS concept is to allow not only selected guest scientists but also our best faculty members to conduct top-level research while offering young scientists the chance to develop their talents in the inspiring environment of outstanding senior scientists. To this end, fellows on different levels of seniority will be given the possibility to devote their full time to innovative research projects in nascent areas of science which bear the promise of major scientific breakthroughs. Given the excellent academic record of the fellows, start-up funding for these projects will be granted not on the basis of detailed research proposals but on the trust in the excellence of TUM-IAS’s members. Since unexpected results are desirable, fellows will be encouraged to explore promising new leads as they occur.

The Institute for Advanced Study of Technische Universität München is the centerpiece of TUM’s institutional strategy to promote top-level research in the so-called Excellence Initiative by the German federal and state governments.